jeudi 14 avril 2016

ARISS first school contact in the Czech Republic

The first school ARISS contact in the Czech Republic

On March 8
2016 HAM radio club OK2KYJ established a scheduled radio contact with
the amateur radio station aboard the ISS (OR4ISS). The ESA astronaut Tim
Peake (KE5UDN) from Great Britain was the radio operator of the space
station.

Over 300 people gathered at the Faculty of Science of
Palacky University in Olomouc in early morning on Tuesday 8th March
2016. Apart from guests representing the city of Olomouc, heads of
various institutions, there were mostly students and teachers from three
schools: Slovanske gymnazium Olomouc, Gymnazium Cajkovskeho and
Gymnazium Olomouc – Hejcin, present in the contact room. They met
together to gain knowledge about the space and the International Space
Station (ISS). There were also representative students from each of the
three schools, which had together prepared 18 questions to the
astronaut.

After a few technical introductions, space and
communication related topics (including how amateur radio works) and an
excellent speech about the ISS prepared by Mgr. Lukas Richterek Ph. D.,
the radio club OK2KYJ started to call the astronaut on the board of the
ISS. There were two operators of station: Ivo Dostal (OK2VWX) and Vilem
Horacek (OK2BC), who were responsible for order of the students and the
PTT button. Leo Hucin (OK2UUJ) was the radio coordinator of the contact.
Eva Farmackova was the coordination teacher for this event. The radio
contact started according to earlier predictions and plans. The radio
signal during the contact was strong. The audio was loud and clear.

ISS/Tim
Peak: Hello Oscar Kilo two Kilo Yankee Juliet this is Oscar Romeo four
India Sierra Sierra. I hear you weak but readable OVER

Ivo: Good
morning this is Ocean Kilo two Kilo Yankee Juliet fifty nine, very nice
signal. And now mike over to my colleague. ROGER

Tim: Good
morning Oscar Kilo two Kilo Yankee Juliet. I have you five by nine now,
and it is a huge privilege to be speaking with the Czech Republic for
the first time HAM radio call and I’m ready for your questions. OVER

Eva:
Hi Tim, this is Eva and the students with EU 303 contact and a very
warm welcome from Olomouc, Czech Republic. Are you ready for your first
question? OVER

Tim: I am ready. OVER

Q1. Hi Tim, this is Alzbeta: What is it like eating in zero gravity? OVERTim:
Hi Alzbeta, you know eating in zero gravity is a lot of fun because you
do not have to put anything down, you can just let it float in front of
you. Ehm. You do have to be careful not to make too much mess, though.
OVER

Q2. Hi Tim, this is Frantisek. My question is: How can you relax on the ISS? Do you have time to watch movies? OVERTim:
We are normally kept very busy during the week so we don’t really relax
much. But on the weekends, we do get the time off and we get
occasionally to watch a movie or take photographs out of the window or
enjoy social media, something like that. OVER

Q3. Hi Tim, this is Vojtech: Is the day/night cycle the same as on Earth? Are you on shifts? OVERTim:
Hi Vojtech, ehm we don’t work shifts so ehm we actually work a normal
working day from about 7 in the morning till about 8 o’clock at night.
And we stick to Greenwich Mean Time which is half way between Russia and
the, and the U.S.A. approximately. So that’s the kind of working day we
work. OVER

Q4. Hi Tim, this is Barb, this is Karolina with
Barbora´s question: What was the most difficult or strangest thing to
get used to on the ISS? OVERTim: It’s a great question. I think the
most difficult thing is just microgravity and how to orient…., how to
orientate yourself. It’s quite easy to get disorientated because you
could be upside down. You could be working in all sort of different
orientations. OVER

Q5. Hi Tim, this is Monika: Does your stay in space have any influence on your health and if so, how? OVERTim:
Hi Monika, we have to exercise two hours every day to try and stop our
bone density from reducing and to try and stop our muscle mass from
reducing and also we lose a lot of body fluid and we get increased
pressure in our heads. So there are lot of changes going on with our
bodies. OVER

Q6. Hi Tim, this is Robin: What do you miss most from gravity on Earth? OVERTim:
Hi Robin, that’s a good question. I miss being able to lie down in my
bed at night. You know sleeping in the way it’s here is not too bad but
it’s nothing like a good night sleep that you get in a proper bed with
gravity. OVER

Q7. Hi Tim, this is Anna-Marie: How do you deal with the isolation from your family? OVERTim:
Hi Anna-Marie. Oh, we get to talk to our family from the space station.
We can call them and once a week we get a video conference with them as
well. So we do, we do keep in touch with our family. But of course we
miss them. Six months away from our family is a long time. OVER

Q8. Hi Tim, this is Linda: Is it possible to catch a cold on the ISS or is it a completely sterile environment? OVERTim:
Hi Linda, that’s a great question. You know we shouldn’t catch a cold
on the ISS where there are no viruses out here. It is quite sterile and
the pre-flight team works well. Then new people arriving with the new
crews won’t bring any diseases with them. But occasionally there have
been shuffle crews who had come up to the space station with a cold and
that has got round to everybody. OVER

Q9. Hi Tim, this is Tomas: Can you use a 3D printer in the same way as on Earth? OVERTim:
Hi Tomas, Yes, you can use a 3D printer but it does need to be modified
to microgravity. We need to use special materials and special injectors
to make sure that they work correctly in microgravity. OVER

Q10. Hi Tim, this is Alzbeta: How do you overcome weightlessness when back on Earth? OVERTim:
Hi Alzbeta. Well you know it takes us quite a lot of time. It takes
about two weeks before we feel standing steady on our feet again and
able to do most activities. But it will take up to one year, maybe two
years, for our bones density to fully recover when we are back on Earth.
And we have a rehabilitation programme that helps us with that. OVER

Q11.
Hi Tim, this is Frantisek: Does time pass slower or faster in your
daily routine aboard the ISS compared to life on Earth? OVERTim: Hi,
that’s a great question. I think time passes very quickly. We are kept
very busy up here. We just go from one activity to the next activity. So
days go very fast. OVER

Q12. Hi Tim, this is Vojtech: Do you access the Internet in the same fashion as on Earth? OVERTim:
We access the Internet by a server which is based in Houston so it’s
slightly different and it’s very slow. It’s worse than a dial-up speed
normally. So we don’t actually do much activity on the Internet. OVER

Q13. Hi Tim, this is Karolina with Barbora´s question: Do you have any musical instruments on the ISS? OVERTim:
Hi, yes we have a guitar and we have a keyboard on the space station. I
haven’t yet managed to find time to play the guitar but I hope to do so
before I leave. OVER

Q14. Hi Tim, this is Monika: Are you planning a stay of a small pet aboard the ISS? OVERTim:
Hi Monika, Well you know, we don’t really have pets on board but we
have had some animals in the past. We have had fish on board the space
station. We have had ants, some other insects. And on the future vehicle
some Japanese expert is bringing some mice up to the space station,
which will be returned to Japan and they will be studying their
offspring. OVER

Q15. Hi Tim, this is Robin: Are there any special items that you carry with you all the time? OVERTim:
Hi Robin, well they are not very special but I do carry with me a torch
all the time and a Leatherman because they… ehm I use them probably
about 5 or 6 times every day. OVER

Q16. Hi Tim, this is Anna-Marie: What do you think is the biggest problem for humans to go beyond low earth orbit? OVERTim:
Hi Anna-Marie. A great question. I think the biggest problem at the
moment is dealing with Radiation. Because, you know, propulsion
techniques are getting better, we’ll be able to go to Mars. It may take
three, you know, two or three years. But the biggest problem would be
how to protect ourselves from the radiation. OVER

Q17. Hi Tim, this is Linda: How are you being filmed during a spacewalk? OVERTim:
Hi Linda. Well, we have cameras on our helmets that send the signal
over radio, and a backpack one which is big enough to be able to carry
out the video signal. So that’s how we get our images back. And also the
Russians used a camera outside and we downloaded the imagery after the
spacewalk. OVER

Q18. Hi Tim, this is Tomas: Is it possible to compare life on ISS to somewhere on Earth? OVERTim:
Hi Tomas. That’s a good question. I think probably it’s like life on a
submarine in many ways, you know. We’re quite isolated. We have recycled
air; we recycle all of our urine into water. We eat food out of
packages which are warmed up. And we do have hot water, too. So it’s a
kind of environment you might experience living in a submarine. OVER

Eva: Hi Tim, this is Eva. Thank you very much and ARISS for having us today. Best wishes to all aboard the ISS. Be safe. OVER

APPLAUSE
while Tim speaking: Hi Eva, Everybody asked brilliant questions today.
It has been a real pleasure talking to you in the Czech Republic HAM
call this morning and have a great day. Many thanks indeed. Good bye.

Leo: This is Oscar Kilo two Kilo Yankee Juliet. Thank you very much Tim.

Tim:
Good bye off to Oscar Kilo two Kilo Yankee Juliet. This is Oscar Romeo
four India Sierra Sierra. Good bye. Many thanks indeed. It would be
great talking to you again some time. Thank you. Bye bye.

Ivo: Bye bye. AHOJ!

Duration
of the radio contact was approximately eight and half minutes and
students asked all 18 questions to the astronaut and got intelligible
answers for all of them. After the event, there was a lot of happiness
and many words of thanks for supporting and organizing this event. One
of them was to the ARISS team and its mentor for Europe Armand
Budzianowski as well. The event was direct, however in the background
the Faculty of Science enabled a connection by landline with the ARISS
telebridge station in Italy operated by Claudio Ariotti IK1SLD and Fabio
Inglese IW1BND. It was the backup ground station, just in a case of
something wrong in the ground station in Czech Republic. In both
locations, as well as in Ireland, UK, Italy, Poland were also HAM TV
ground stations ready to work to receive video from the ISS and stream
it to the Czech Republic, however the HAM TV transmitter on the ISS was
off, because of a scientific experiment performed at the same time.

The
event was streamed with video to the Internet thanks to AVP UP team and
audio was streamed to Echo Link AMSAT conference room (node 101 377)
thanks to Claudio Ariotti IK1SLD and Fabio Inglese IW1BND. Listeners of
Czech national radio Cesky rozhlas could listen to the event live and
the Czech national TV channel CT24 had about 52 thousand viewers at the
time of live broadcasting.

After the event organizers and
students met with media at a conference. There were reporters from 5 TV
stations, several radio stations and press representatives, both local
and national. Organizers of the event had received many phone calls and
e-mails with thanks and appreciation. Many teachers throughout the Czech
Republic, Slovakia and even one from London, had e-mailed the
coordinating teachers expressing thanks, sharing comments, feedback and
information about the on-line followers. Even Mr. Michal Vaclavik from
the Czech Space Office had found time to e-mail a few words of
congratulations to us from Costa Rica’s International Conference along
with Charles Bolden, Bill Nelson, Franklin Chang Diaz, Takao Doi, Luca
Parmitano, Kenneth Cameron, Fei Junlong, Liu Wang a Marcos Pontes.What
is more, many teachers of English as a second language keep showing
interest and ask for the transcription of the event as well as the
recording and video for further use in their English lessons. They have
also started using English texts about ISS, space and amateur radio
contacts as reading comprehension exercises to make their lessons more
interesting and up-to-date.

And apart from the following list of
links, many members of the Olomouc Amateur Radio Club OK2KYJ have been
asked to speak at AFO (Academic Film Festival in Olomouc) and write
articles about the event for various scientific magazines. Some of the
photos and articles are planned to be displayed at Olomouc Science
Museum with follow-up lectures about the event, ARISS and ISS.